These amazing pictures show motorists being plucked to safety in a desperate helicopter rescue attempt as a massive water main turns a street into a raging torrent.

A car teeters on a barely visible rise as freezing black floodwaters rush past, threatening to wash it away.

Its occupant waits desperately for help as the chill water rams another vehicle against it.

TV footage shows the cage being lowered to rescue the occupant of the white car

A cage-like basket is dangled from a helicopter high above as the stranded motorist reaches out to grasp hold.

But then the basket swings tantalisingly out of reach and the driver's terrifying ordeal continues.

Moments earlier in the U.S. drama just outside Washington D.C., another driver was filmed struggling to push open a door, then reaching for the steel basket suspended from a rescue helicopter high overhead.

A moment later a child was passed from the car into the wildly rocking basket - and finally the adult climbed in to it.

Rescuers struggle through the icy floodwaters after the massive water main burst

A rescue basket carries a driver and child to safety

The pair were winched high above the street in Bethesda, Maryland, and borne to safe ground before the chopper returned to pluck more victims from the danger flood.

The 96in water main - said to be the largest in the county - burst early in the morning as shoppers headed out for Christmas supplies.

The entire nailbiting sequence was filmed against a backdrop of black, rushing water in which cars were perched, seeming barely to hold ground against the force of the flood.

A wider view shows how the waters swept cars against each other. At top a rescue boat is visible

Helicopter crews scramble to the rescue

Rescuers looked on helplessly from vantage points along the submerged street - appropriately named River Road.

A fire department spokesman said at least 15 people had been rescued so far.

'At eight o'clock this morning some motorists were confronted with a four or five-foot wall of water,' he added.

'Some of the vehicles were washed off the road way.

'We have accounted for everyone so far although some have required treatment for hypothermia.'

Police said one of the vehicles had overturned completely with its driver inside.